hello, i'm geeta guru-murthy. this is the context on bbc news. president trump created the conditions to end the war. decimating - choose your word- obliterating, destroying iran's nuclear capabilities. translation: the us failed to take action and did not achieve their initiatives.

we followed closely, and there was no indication to the united states that any of that enriched uranium was moved prior to the strike. everyone expresses the same worry- the is not going to hold in this war is going to erupt again. the us defense secretary, pete hegseth, has described america's military strike's against iran's nuclear programme as "historically successful". speaking at a news conference in washington, he mounted a robust and occasionally angry defence of the mission. he also attacked sections of the media for, in his words, "fawning" over early intelligence report on the strikes and suggesting they showed the us attacks had limited impact. it comes after iran's supreme leader appeared on state tv claiming victory over israel and saying the us attacks "failed to achieve anything significant". more on that shortly. first, here's some of what pete hegseth had to say. president trump directed the most complex and secretive military operation in history, and it was a resounding success,

resulting in a ceasefire agreement and the end of the 12 day war. there's been a lot of discussion about what happened and what didn't happen. step back for a second. because of decisive military action, president trump created the conditions to end the war, decimating - choose your word - obliterating, destroying iran's nuclear capabilities. iran's supreme leader made his first appearance on state tv since the 12 day war. he said donald trump had "exaggerated" the impact of america's strikes on their nuclear facilities. translation: the president of the united states exaggerated events in unusual ways, and it turns out he needed this exaggeration. anyone who's heard these words has understood there is another truth behind them. the us has failed to take action and has not achieved their intended objective.

our chief international correspondent lyse doucet is in the iranian capital, tehran. she is being allowed to report from there on condition that none of her coverage is used on the bbc's persian service, which broadcasts to the people of iran. this law from the authorities applies to all international media agencies operating in iran. well, it was a defiant speech, an angry speech. he declared that the islamic republic of iran would never surrender to the us. he accused the united states of being hostile to iran ever since the iranian revolution of 1979. it has to be said that the 86-year-old ayatollah has never trusted the united states, even when they were in negotiations over a nuclear deal. and after the events of the past few weeks, that distrust runs very, very deep. and we happened to watch his speech in a destroyed section of the state tv compound that had been targeted by an israeli missile.

they said they were taking aim at the propaganda arm of the islamic regime, and the main studio which should've aired the ayatollah's speech is now just a black hole, completely reduced to ash when a fire swept through a vast section of that complex. and that darkness just seemed to symbolise the darkness of this moment now facing iran, and however defiant the supreme leader - the final authority here on all matters - is in public, in private, he is facing some of the most difficult and dangerous decisions of his nearly 40 years at the helm. and everyone we neet meet here, whether they support the government or not, they express enormous relief that there is this ceasefire. it's in its third day. it's holding, but they all, to a person, they say they worry that war will erupt again. still you can feel the city's slowly returning,

at least on the surface, to its normal rhythms. more people are coming back to the city. cameron chalmers more shops are opening, with iranians telling us that, you know, as hard as it was to stay away, they know it's go to be hard here. but they want to be with their neighbours and family as they all worry about what the future will bring. live to washington and our north america correspondent jon donnison. what is been the reaction from what we learned from the pete had sith press conference in the tone of it? it was pretty forthright and not backing down from the administration's view and they obliterated to use one of the words that used that they obliterated iran's nuclear programme. we got a lot of

detail about what the attack involved this weekend but what we did not get is any evidence of the damage that it caused. what we know is those new -- huge bunker busting bombs being dropped. this operation had been planned for a long time and we know that it hit exactly where the americans wanted to hit on the fordow complex. we note the munitions hit where they want to them to hit metres below the grid but we don't know the damage it was done. we had the head of the international atomic energy agency saying today that they believed that the centrifuges fordow were no longer working. we don't know the extent of the damage and crucially we did not get any proof today that the 400 or so kilos of enriched uranium that iran needs to develop a bomb, whether that was at the site when it was hit. i want to ask you one more point on gaza because we've had

some news in the last hour that the us department has approved $30 million for funding for the gaza humanitarian foundation. what more is known about that? this announcement came from the state department. 30 million for this very controversial organisation which is backed by the that it states in israel but has been slammed as a death trap by some human officials. and over the past couple of months since may, more than 400 palestinians have been shot and killed while trying to get a from those limited distribution centres run by this foundation. we've seen truly desperate scenes of palestinians scrambling to get food, running across a large open areas of land to try and get to these trucks. in many of them getting killed and injured. but the administration here putting more money in, 30 million and urging other countries to do the same. thank you very much

indeed for that. for more, let's speak now to emily harding, director of the intelligence, national security, and technology program at the center for strategic and international studies. she was also worked at the cia, where she led analysts and analytic programmes in the middle east and served as director for iran during a tour at the national security council. thanks very much for being with us. just from the briefing we heard today from the secretary of defence and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, did you take anything new from that? the substance was from what i can see that the modelling that they have shows that this was a strike and obviously of a norm is for their specific information about the damage done? it was certainly an astonishing amount of information they provided, and it did seem that they really wanted to correct the record from the leak over the weekend about the initial intelligence report suggesting that the damage had perhaps

been limited. i thought it was really interesting the way that general dan caine in particular let out the difference between an initial intelligence report and one created later with more detail and more information. at first reported scenes was based on just brand-new information, very limited information and was put up with low confidence. that's a pretty normal practice for the intelligence community. once you get more information and can process it, you can put together a much more comprehensive assessment and that cindy what they wanted to present today. i thought it was quite compelling to have they were describing how the operation when exactly and the object as it managed to accomplish. in terms of the detail they gave him they talked about how it was carried out, but did they actually show that they knew for sure what level of damage has been done to that facility? they did not, and i suspect they won't for quite a while, for a couple of reasons. number one is what dan

caine set about damage assessments in the military does not grade his own homework. if the military is the one carrying out an operation, you don't want them coming back and reporting on what they did and that being the end of it. the intelligence community needs time. iran is a hard target and you certainly cannot walk up there and take pictures and certainly cannot get inside so it will take a while to pull together the information to get a more complete picture. the other piece is what the general said at the end which is there are a lot of capabilities the us has and their allies have but they are bringing to bear on this problem to try to get this information. if you tell the press unfortunately what you found, it also reveals your hand the people who would like to shut down those intelligence collection opportunities so you get no more insight in the future. they should be selective about it what they release exactly, but it is important to come out and be very honest about what actually was accomplished with the strikes and how much of the iranian nuclear programme is left. is there the technology available to actually work out

how much damage there is? it was so deep beneath the ground and no one can access the top of the sites. this is the question. what they're going to be looking at is not only overhead imagery, so things taken from satellite or other kinds of platforms which really look at the roof and what's going on outside the site as the iranians try to excavate but they will also be doing things are calling on human sources that they have technical collection to try to figure out discussions going on inside the regime to figure out what the iranians even know about what they have left. he will also be looking at normal patterns of behaviour if something still existed and how they will be treating it and if it did not exist, how would they be excavating it and trying to recover it? these little tiny pieces of information is how intelligent professionals really shine. the pull all those things together and try to come up with that complete picture. and yet in the meantime we are hearing donald trump in the administration say they are trying to move ahead in a positive way with the iranians

but if iran still has the capacity and the knowledge, and the big fear is they will just move really quickly to produce a nuclear weapon in a weapon asked capacity in then you have the regime in place that israel and others to be very worried about? absolutely, and that if the worst-case scenario honestly. as i've said several times over the past few days, this is not a mission you can do halfway. there is just too much of an incident for the iranians government to want to sprint to a bomb if they think that it's possible that israel is going to come back and for this again even in a years. if they have mobility left over to try to create that weapon. so it is critically important that we collect that information and out what they have left in what capabilities they have and then if they do still have a remainder of a chance to make a weapon that we address it along with our partners in the region. and how would you expect that to be addressed because long-term if the knowledge as there, many have made the point include in the uk foreign secretary that you

cannot erase and i and therefore diplomacy and politics is the only long-term solution? it is certainly the ideal solution. you're right, you cannot bomb knowledge. the iranians will know how to make new advanced centrifuges because i love you and the other ones does not mean they cannot rebuild them. uranium is findable in one of the supply chain that my career be able to dump if the conversion facility was hit and that is going to affect how they can create the rest of their programme. but i do think it's really important that we answer that question and the diplomacy is clearly the best way to go about it. i think iran should understand that it has lost its particular 12 day war even to the supreme leader said different today in a statement in their best way forward is to negotiate and come to a solution and then rejoin the region. i want to ask you one more question about the whole question of trust within the us and around the world and with the government there is telling us about the efficacy of this operation

because was asked at that briefing whether he had come under any pressure to be displayed a very brief clip of that. that one's easy - no. no, i have not, and, no, i would not. my job as the chairman is to offer a range of options to the president and the national command authority, to deliver the risks associated with each of those and then take the orders of the national command authority and go execute them. this... i've never been pressured by the president or the secretary to do anything other than tell them exactly what i'm thinking, and that's exactly what i've done. the joint chiefs of staff there because that question of trust is crucial. the independence of any statements we get from senior figures like that from the intelligence or military world. it really is in for two reasons. first of all, for the faith and trust of the image of people and their allies, you want to know people are level with the whistling is critical important as to whether or not

iran can get a nuclear weapon but also just for the functioning of government. if the president is not even the truth, that he cannot make the best decisions with information that he has and nobody should shrink back from telling the some of the battle damage assessments come back would not such a great assessment, then he needs to hear it. he may not like it but he needs to hear it because that's how we can make the best decisions. very briefly, people are still wondering about regime change and if iran still have the capacity and the enriched uranium if it still hidden there, regime change force from an outside intervention in particular like israel, do you think that's likely? i think it's unlikely and also think it is just merely speaking something it is not work. the iranian people have been to satisfy with the government for a long time and i cannot think that they think the war went particular well but try to push that from the outside really is just going to result in a backlash. the iranian people have to make a decision about who they want to govern them.

sir keir starmer has confirmed he is in talks with labour rebels who are refusing to back his plans to reform welfare spending. the government's plan includes restricting the eligibility for personal independence payment, pip, and limiting the sickness related element of universal credit. more than 120 labour mps backed an amendment that would effectively block the bill from passing. our political correspondent joins me from westminster for that this would be a sizeable rebellion in the government have indicated clearly they are trying to resolve this but sir keir starmer's operation is being criticised. it is, i can tell you that in the last sort of 15-20 minutes, there is been a lot of talk flying around westminster that some sort of

concessions are being talked about and may well be immanent that we can hear more about that. so we will wait to see. but the view is that keir starmer has been kind of forced into this. the government have been talking tough up until yesterday, saying it was going to press ahead with these benefit cuts, these big reforms to the welfare bill to try to bring that bill or at least prevent it rising as fast as it has been. now it seems that in the face of more than hundred and 20 labour mps who have been adamant that they were not going to support this and can block the legislation when it was due to come to parliament on tuesday, that's forced to prime minister's and and it seems what's been discussed is a pretty big climb-down if we get the details confirmed. and that would mean what's being talked about is that those existing claimants of benefits under the old plan would see cuts, quite a lot of them, some

would not. but what's being talked about now, amongst people here, is that those existing claimants could be protected and they keep the benefits as they are in the changes would only apply to new claimants. that's not confirmed and we are waiting to hear on that. but it would mark if it did a significant u-turn by the government and also the question would be is this enough to buy off the rebels to secure the position to the government can move forward? that is what keir starmer was saying today. he still wants to move ahead on tuesday. it may be enough that we'll wait to see the details. thank you and if we hear we will come back to you or certainly try. thanks very much indeed. whilst sir keir starmer's labour party is trying to overcome their differences on welfare policy, a new poll out today will be fresh on their minds. it shows that if the election took place today, the reform party of nigel farage would get the most seats in parliament.

that's according to the latest poll from yougov, their first major poll since last year's election. reform would be the largest party, with more seats than labour and the conservatives combined. the research is based on thousands of people and links voters and characteristics to help with its projection. it is not a forecast, but an estimate of what could happen if the election was held today. we can now speak to professor sir john curtice, who is a british political scientist and professor of politics at the university of strathclyde. thanks very much for being with us. what do you make of this poll and how civic and is it? in a sense, it should not come as a surprise to anybody who is full of british politics with any degree of detail at all. in the sense that reform, a heavily progressive party led by nigel farage, one of the principal at childers for brexit back in 2016, that party has been ahead of everybody else consistently in the opinion poll since about february, creating what is

unprecedented in british politics. not to say however, some viewers may also recall that back in the general election last year, reform got 50% of the vote but only got five seats and that the electoral system, our first past the post system seem to treat them rather harshly. the question is now that reform are ahead of the opinion polls, just how well would they do and this pole gives us some clues. basically it's saying even though actually in this pole, the estimated lead for reform of filler is only three points, that's about half the average lead in most of the polls, but despite that, this pole is saying now that reform are ahead, the fact that their votes are evenly spread across the country, a big advantage if you are only coming third, is no longer such a disadvantage. indeed it also shows one of the crucial thing, which is in a sense just underlines how unprecedented the challenge that we now have in britain to

the traditional dominance of our politics by conservative and labour. first of all, this pole like many others is only about 40% of people who have a preference by saying they would vote for either of those two parties. that is the first time in our polling history but secondly but we are also seeing in this pole, where is the conservative vote falling most? in constituencies they are trying to defend. where is the labour vote falling most? it was as they did well last year. inevitably it means that when it comes to be outcomes and seats in the pole, reform are very clearly ahead, albeit certainly still well short of what would be required to win an overall majority. interns where be art a and tying it up the welfare problem that labour are facing, there is a speculation that morgan mcsweeney, chief of staff to the prime minister, has been very focused on reform and part of the reasoning for the

welfare cuts is not just financially but also that it might appeal to potential reform voters and some in the party criticised him for that move, emanating reform on other areas and some say the party is to focus on it. the travails of all the main parties of course are now very much linked and we see that in policy? yes, i think two points to make in response to that was of the truth is that reform are thinking more votes off the conservatives then off labour and again you can sleep in this pole where the conservatives particularly betty performed. labour in contrast or losing some votes to reform, but actually there are also losing more to the green party and liberal democrats and again you can see in the details of this pole where under going down most heavily. if the green party and a liberal democrats doing damage in an unnecessarily reform. yes,

reform can now take seats off of her back but a lot of that is a result of reform is getting votes off conservative and therefore being able to overtake a declining labour party. .1 is lingmerth three's vote is losing everywhere, albeit reform are currently in charge in terms of seats took the second thing is the prime minister has authority for as long as there mps think that they are pursuing a path that is likely to result in those mps reelection. that presumption on behalf of labour mps which was there or you're going to lead them to a very strong landslide victory, that perception i think is now much weaker was that they already blamed the prime minister from one welfare cut which was cutting funding for pensioners to help them pay their winter fuel bills and i think another also very clear many of them that if the government were to pursue its current plans, this could also be electorally

constant of their party. and therefore them. and when you say the result of this poll shows that reform obviously would not win an outright majority, the assumption is depending on the leader of the conservatives is, they could potentially form a coalition with them and with the challenge then be from eight labour, liberal democrat, green party coalition? woodhouse a number still us in terms of who would form government? the entry thing but this the lipo is it just happens to catch things and suggested actually the whole thing would be on a knife edge. that basically they would be about 315 conservative and reform mps and there would be about 315 lara, liberal democrat and green party and scottish and welsh national parties and that the balance would be held by the 18 mps that are elected from northern ireland, some of whom will be more likely to back a reform - conservative balance, the dup in particular and others

however would prefer a liver minority government. the truth is one of the other things this pole is reminding us is that british politics is now in a another way i presented it and that is we have got five political parties that makes it much more difficult to get a majority. thank you so much a very grateful. we